January 25, 2015 – People are living longer and requiring more costly long-term care services such as home care, assisted living care, and nursing home care. Because the government is concerned about people draining their assets to pay for long-term care and subsequently putting pressure on the Medicaid system, some state governments and Uncle Sam offer tax credits and deductions that can reduce your premiums on a private qualified long-term care insurance policy. Here are the rules for 2015:

January 2015 – I’m proud to announce that the Board of Trustees of the W. Eugene Smith Fund has reappointed me as Treasurer of the Fund for a third consecutive year. I served as Secretary of the Board for the three years prior to becoming Treasurer.

The W. Eugene Smith Fund for Humanistic Photography is a non-profit organization that issues annual grants to photojournalists to pursue photographic projects focusing on the human condition in the spirit of W. Eugene Smith, the famous LIFE magazine photographer. My tasks include fundraising and producing the annual grant ceremony at the School of Visual Arts. (I secured Canon USA’s sponsorship for the past five years.) My fellow board members are affiliated with Christie’s, International Center of Photography, Getty Images, Harbers Family Foundation, PhotoDistrict News, The New Yorker,Vanity Fair, and other leading photography organizations.

In The Wall Street Journal’s special Mansion supplement, Andriotis explores how some home buyers are using cash to dodge large mortgages or lock in lower loan rates.

AnnaMaria interviewed Schindler, a Financial Advisor, regarding how he reduced the interest rate on his own mortgage:

When Aaron Schindler’s offer was accepted on a two-bedroom, two-bathroom co-op in New York’s Upper West Side, he figured he’d make a 30% down payment and borrow the rest. But his mortgage broker said a jumbo loan would come with a 4.65% fixed rate, costing thousands of dollars in extra interest payments. So Mr. Schindler, a financial adviser, put 45% down, trading a jumbo mortgage for a smaller 4.37% rate. “It was the perfect middle ground,” he says.

Andriotis and Hill discuss how sticking to a portoflio allocation plan in 2011 versus trading on headlines of potential municipal and European sovereign defaults generated better results with most municipal bonds positive and the S&P 500 even for the year. Within the framework of a long-term allocation plan, the reporters ask Schindler what assets might outperform in the short to medium term:

Aaron Schindler, managing director at Wealth Advisory Group in New York, is telling clients to add more dividend-paying stocks to their portfolios, especially those in sectors with higher payouts, such as telecom and energy. He also suggests REITs, which must pay at least 90% of their taxable income (rents less expenses) to shareholders – as Americans continue to favor renting over buying real estate.

Levisohn and Light explore how portfolios might react to last week’s coordinated moves by the Fed, European Central Bank, and central banks of England, Japan, Canada, and Switzerland to support and create liquidity in the global banking system. The reporters explain how the various equity and bond markets responded to seven coordinate international interventions since 1931, and how investors might position their portfolios now.

Aaron Schindler, a financial planner at Wealth Advisory Group in New York, recommends keeping as much as 30% of your portfolio in cash or a safe short-term bond fund, such as the Vanguard Short-Term Bond Index.

SmartMoney, the Wall Street Journal’s personal finance and investing magazine, quotes Aaron Schindler about how companies are trimming the benefits of group disability policies offered to employees. A disability insurance benefit replaces and pays a percentage of the insured worker’s salary if he or she becomes disabled and can’t work due to an accident or illness. The story concludes that the ways to make-up for these cutbacks are typically to purchase supplemental group coverage or an individual policy through one’s financial advisor.

For employees, the results are potentially grim. The odds of becoming disabled and unable to work are daunting. A healthy 35-year-old has about a 21% chance of becoming disabled for three months or longer during his career, according to the Council for Disability Awareness. And the average age of disabled-worker beneficiaries is around 53, according to the Social Security Administration. But in spite of the odds, most people don’t know what disability insurance is or covers, says Aaron Schindler, a certified financial planner at the New York-based Wealth Advisory Group.” They would typically only know about it if it’s offered at a job.” In fact, of the policies purchased in 2010, around 90% came through employers.

The “Wealth Matters” column in The New York Times quotes Aaron Schindler on managing assets and financial planning for successful artists. Titled How the Rich and Famous Can Stay Rich (if not Famous), Wealth Matters columnist Paul Sullivan spoke to Schindler about the challenges of getting creative people to plan their finances and make adjustments according to age, career arc, shifting goals and dependents, and the type of legacy the artist wants to leave.

New York-based financial planner Aaron Schindler, who oversees $40 million in assets with Wealth Advisory Group LLC, has also been bargain-hunting. On March 15, after Japan’s nuclear scare had pushed the S&P Metals & Mining Select Industry Index down 6%, Schindler bought shares of the SPDR S&P 500 Metals and Mining exchange-traded fund (XME). At the time, the ETF was down 7% from its recent high, he said. He had been looking to buy the ETF at $66.60, but on the 15th “fears ratcheted up” from the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, and he was able to buy it at $66.54, he said. The ETF closed Wednesday at $73.99.

On March 16, Schindler purchased shares of iShares MSCI Australia Index (EWA), which was down more than 9% from about a week earlier, he said. The index is about 30% invested in metals and mining, which he believes will likely benefit from Japan’s rebuilding. “I see the Australian economy as growth oriented; it’s in good shape and it’s a commodity play,” he said.

The SPDR S&P 500 Metals and Mining ETF can be very volatile, so Schindler purchased it for his younger clients, while iShares MSCI Australia Index went into the portfolios of his older clients and those with more moderate to conservative portfolios, he said.

In Wealth Manager: A Contrarian Play on Inflation Fears, The Wall Street Journal ‘Weekend Investor’ discussed investing in floating-rate bonds with Aaron Schindler as a potential way to make money if inflation hits and interest rates rise. With the interest rate floating or reset on these bonds every 60 to 100 days, floating rate bonds are one of the few fixed income securities that typically correlate with interest rates. While short in duration, these bonds typically have a junk rating representing a higher risk of default than higher credit bonds.

PBS ‘Nightly Business Report’ Correspondent Erika Miller interviewed Aaron Schindler in the New York studio about the Securities and Exchange Commission proposal to temporarily institute circuit breakers on all the stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index after the huge market gyrations on May 6.